Viral
by Botosphere
Summary: Birthday!fic for DarthIshtar. Fassbinder and Sharsky take their hacking to the next level.


Author's Note: Happy Birthday, Ish! I wrote this at her request, but the lucky birthday girl will be traveling in Europe for the next week and a half. (Feel free to be jealous, because I sure am!) :) I'm posting it a couple of days early since she might or might not have stable internet access while abroad.

In terms of our fanon, it loosely ties into both "A Very Roomie Christmas" and "Destroyer of Worlds" and so has spoilers for "Kinship" and "The Tie That Binds." Hope you enjoy! ~ Eowyn77

* * *

Sharsky grunted softly as he hefted Lisbeth's suitcase. "What's in this thing? Bowling balls?"

Fassbinder smacked him on the back of the head with Lisbeth's shoe bag since he figured the dress bag in his other hand wasn't heavy enough. Still, to his girlfriend, he asked, "You really need this much luggage?"

"It's a week-long Broadway workshop in New York City," she reminded them, picking up her prized theater makeup kit and her purse and leading the way to the living room. "I need to be prepared."

Sam and the ever-silent Cam were waiting for them by the front door. All three of them handed Lisbeth's gear off to Cam, and jock that he was, he carried all of it without breaking a sweat.

"Besides," Sam smirked at his roommates as he opened the door and started walking toward the bright yellow Camaro waiting at the curb, "since we're giving her a lift, she doesn't _have_ to travel light."

Fassbinder didn't feel too badly volunteering Sam and his wheels to spend an afternoon playing taxi. It was the first week of summer between their sophomore and junior years, which meant Sam's lady-love was out West with her dad for a couple of weeks. The fact that Leo was also in California until Friday meant Sam was practically a hermit right now. He was doing Sam a favor by getting him out of the apartment for a while.

With a little effort, they loaded all the gear into the trunk and, turning, Lisbeth smiled up at Fassbinder, her eyes dancing with excitement. "See you on Saturday!"

"Break a leg," he told her and stole a quick kiss that she drew out for an extra second or two. When Sharsky wolf-whistled, Fassbinder flipped him off.

Sam, Cam, and Lisbeth piled into the car and drove off, leaving Fassbinder and Sharsky waving after them. Once the Autobot rounded the corner, Sharsky asked, "How are you gonna survive without her for a week?"

Sharsky had been teasing, but Fassbinder held up a jump drive with a smirk of his own. "Easy. The genie granted my third wish."

"No way!" Sharsky tried to snatch the jump drive, but Fassbinder's hand curled into a fist around it. Sharsky hadn't been able to weasel out of Fassbinder how exactly he'd coerced 'Bee into doing three favors for him, but he suspected blackmail was involved. Why else would 'Bee give them a copy of an honest-to-Cthulhu alien robot virus? "You gotta let me see it!"

Grinning, Fassbinder turned and started walking the five blocks to their apartment. "A Zookeeper's Special is the price of admission."

"Greedy," Sharsky grumbled, but he was already pulling his phone out of his pocket to call in the pizza order.

As soon as they got home, Fassbinder fired up his laptop and cracked open a Red Bull.

"Wait!" Sharsky said, his eyes wide with horror. "I just realized...that's a _sentient_ software virus - do we really want to upload it to your computer?"

Fassbinder shrugged. "It isn't _really_ sentient. He just said the AI was advanced enough that it would look that way to us, and besides, it's deactivated, so it's harmless. Even if it weren't, all it does is affect their motor control systems, so what's it going to do to a laptop?" And with that, he plugged the drive in.

They spent the next half hour figuring out the GUI Cam had written so that they could read and understand the virus and spent the twelve hours after that in a taurine-fueled code-monkey bliss, tinkering with actual, _alien_ software. The sun was starting to rise at that point, so they decided to call it a night. Sharsky wanted his own copy of the virus, too, so Fassbinder let him save the modified virus to Sharsky's DropBox. Then they both hit the sack.

Sometime around noon, the DVD-ROM drive on Fassbinder's laptop popped open on its own.

…

High above Earth, Soundwave kept his vigil on the Autobots and their allies. Something fundamental had changed in Optimus Prime. His last transmission had piqued Lord Megatron's curiosity, and so he'd ordered Soundwave to return to Earth to discover what that change was.

The Autobots had taken the normal precautions to secure their base on Diego Garcia, but Soundwave could hack the humans while in recharge. He still made occasional forays against the Autobots via the worldwide web, but most of the time it wasn't even necessary. If he based his monitoring around the Pentagon and Optimus' pet human Sam, then he knew 90% of what he wanted to. That was his official reason for also keeping tabs on the squishies designated Mikaela Baines, Ron and Judy Witwicky, Leo Spitz, Glenn Morshower, Seymour Simmons, Sarah Lennox, Mohammed al-Sharif, Nadipati Fassbinder, and Joseph Sharsky. He routed all of their internet traffic to flow through his own processors and sifted through the dross of Farmville and World of Warcraft to discover the nuggets of knowledge that would give Lord Megatron the victory.

He'd never admit it to Megatron, but Soundwave was also beginning to understand why the Autobots had made pets of the humans. Individually they were dull little insects, but when they started fitting and working together, they were able to build some things that were truly remarkable, considering the low level of their intellect. If only the Decepticons could harness the humans' collective creativity and drive.

An email to Nadipati from his femme caught Soundwave's attention: Sam and Bumblebee were in New York City for the afternoon. He forwarded the information to Lord Megatron in case it would be of tactical value and then resumed monitoring the reality TV show Seymour Simmons was currently streaming.

When Seymour went dormant for recharge, Soundwave shifted his attention to Sarah Lennox. She checked her financial accounts every morning, including the stock market funds she monitored for the Autobots, and the Decepticon noted that Sideswipe's balance had increased substantially since the last time he'd looked. Soundwave shifted some of his own holdings so that his portfolio matched the Pit-spawn's a little better.

He knew the Lennox's sparkling femme had woken up when Sarah's internet traffic shifted to streaming Dora the Explorer. The thought of a talking monkey wearing boots made Soundwave's tanks churn - the whole phenomenon of talking cartoon animals was evidence that the humans would be better off serving Lord Megatron. Clearly, their imaginations needed to be channeled better.

To his relief, Joseph was online again by that point and was logging into World of Warcraft. The battle tactics utilized in the game were simplistic to the point of being ridiculous, but it was amusing to see how seriously the insects took themselves sometimes. He activated his own character and joined the raid.

He was so engrossed in observing the various humans over the next several hours, in fact, that he didn't notice when one of his tentacles attached to the human-built satellite twitched.

…

Megatron strode onto the bridge of the Fallen's former spaceship. It had crashed here eons ago and would never fly again, but it was still shelter against the harsh conditions of the planet Char.

Skywarp, the Seeker who had requested Megatron's presence on the bridge, bowed to him. "My lord, we're receiving a distress call from Soundwave."

"Let me hear it," Megatron ordered, and Skywarp patched the transmission into the command channel.

"...point to two possibilities: I have been hacked or I have been attacked with a cybernetic warfare agent."

"Soundwave, report."

The voice that came over the comm channel was more shaken than he'd ever heard from the mech (though he was still more calm and collected than Starscream on his best day). "Lord Megatron, I have lost most of my motor control. I'm currently in a decaying orbit and will likely make an uncontrolled landing in approximately two Earth solar cycles."

Frowning, Megatron said, "It will take us twice that long to reach you."

"Acknowledged." It was subtle, but there was defeat in Soundwave's voice.

Megatron considered his next move. If it were any mech but Soundwave, he'd leave the wretch on Earth to fend for himself until he was either strong enough to find his own way home or until the Decepticons had other plans that involved that miserable mudball.

But it _was_ Soundwave, and somehow either a hacker or a virus had slipped past his famously impenetrable firewalls. Megatron dismissed the second option - it was laughable - and considered the first. Jazz was the only Autobot Megatron was aware of who had ever successfully hacked Soundwave, and even then it was when the Decepticon had been severely injured in battle. But Jazz was dead...although these days extinguishing a mech wasn't the guarantee it used to be.

If Optimus was reigniting the entire Autobot army, then Megatron was going to have a fight on his servos for the first time in more than 150 vorns. That alone was reason enough to intervene.

Aloud, he said, "You are fortunate, Soundwave, that you have served me so long and so well. Starscream and his trine-mates will retrieve you. I will punish whoever had the audacity to attack one of my officers."

"Acknowledged, Lord Megatron."

The warlord heard the gratitude in Soundwave's voice and smirked. _Don't you forget it._

…

Lisbeth grinned when there was a knock on her motel-room door. She eagerly peeked through the peephole and her grin faded a little. There was no sign of Fassbinder - it was just Sam and Cam in the hallway. Still, she opened the door for them, grateful that they'd come all this way to give her a ride home. There was no way she could have juggled all her luggage on a train.

"Hi, guys."

"Hi," Sam greeted while Cam started scooping up her bags. "Fassbinder sends his apologies. Apparently his computer managed to pick up a virus."

That made her do a double-take. "How does a self-proclaimed hacking god pick up a virus?"

He glared at Cam for no apparent reason as the big blond walked out into the hallway. "We're not sure."

"Well, what's it doing?" she wondered, pulling the door closed behind her. "His credit card numbers weren't stolen, were they?"

"No, nothing like that," Sam assured her. "The DVD player on his laptop won't stay shut."

Lisbeth snorted. "I'm gone for a week and he picks up a cyber-STD."

Ahead of them, Cam made a strangled sound and his shoulders started to shake. Lisbeth smirked, pleased that she could make the alien laugh. It was a just a guess that he was an alien, but over the past year and a half, she'd heard Fassbinder and the guys make enough thinly-veiled jokes and seen enough of Cam's quirks to be convinced that he wasn't exactly human. Still, Lisbeth had learned to appreciate his easy, joking manner and the fact that Fassbinder trusted him. Wherever he'd been born or spawned or whatever, to Lisbeth he was just one of the guys.

They checked her out of the motel and, with some creative rearranging, they were able to get all of Lisbeth's stuff into the trunk. Cam gallantly took the back seat so Lisbeth could ride shotgun - yet another reason she approved of him. They hadn't made it out of Manhattan, though, when a plane flying below the buildings buzzed them.

Lisbeth poked her head out the window to see it better. "Wha…?"

Sam recklessly swerved, cutting Lisbeth off and making her flail for the panic handles, and the car ducked into the entrance of an underground parking garage. Lisbeth's eyes widened when the car doors opened and seat belts disengaged on their own, and both she and Sam were dumped out onto the concrete. The speakers blared, "Quick! Hide!" over the squealing of tires and the car sped toward the exit.

Lisbeth sat there for a second, blinking stupidly and unable to get beyond the thought that her prized theater makeup kit had just driven off.

Muttering "slag" repeatedly under his breath, Sam rushed to her and pulled her to her feet.

Tearing her gaze away from the garage exit, she asked Sam, "Did Cam just…?"

An earth-shaking crash interrupted her again, and a booming voice outside roared, "Bumblebee!"

Sam visibly paled. "Frag." Ducking low, he started creeping toward daylight.

"What?" Lisbeth whispered, following him.

"Look," he hissed, "Cam isn't what you think."

"He's your alien bodyguard, right?" Sam stopped and turned to look at her, stunned, and she smiled ever so slightly. "I do pay attention, you know. Why'd he steal your car, though? Wouldn't he want you safe inside it?"

"He _is_ the car."

Lisbeth's mouth was an "O" of surprise - to Sam's visible relief.

The sound of some kind of laser-weapon firing made Sam cringe, though, and he started creeping toward the garage exit again. Lisbeth resigned herself to asking questions later and followed him.

…

New York City was one of the few Earth locations that almost made Megatron nostalgic. The densely-packed angular structures, the steel and smog, the cars clogging the streets - as he flew over them, they were all reminiscent of Cybertron back when it was alive. The fact that it made him feel that way awoke a deep and abiding hatred of the place in his spark.

Soundwave had survived the crash landing, taking only mild damage to his frame and none to his processors. Though grounded, the mech had resumed his assignment of monitoring the Autobots and their allies, and so Megatron knew that somewhere in this city teeming with humans was at least one Autobot.

Thanks to Soundwave, they also knew what had taken the mech down - a particularly nasty strain of the Twitch that had obviously been engineered. It was more virulent than usual, slipping past the defenses of every Decepticon who'd encountered it (including Megatron) and causing both fine and gross motor spasms that were more severe than the Twitch was known to produce. Soundwave had been battling it ever since he'd isolated the code two days ago, but it was already well-established and evolving past his attempts to eradicate it. His efforts weren't entirely wasted, though, and he'd developed some protocols that at least slowed the progression of the virus.

Megatron was already showing symptoms of the illness, but he'd be fragged if he was going to let a little case of the Twitch stop him from getting revenge on the Autobots. Bumblebee was half a world away from the rest of them, and where Bumblebee was, Optimus' pet was likely to be. They were both an easy kill.

He had been away too long - two Earth orbital cycles - and it showed. Bumblebee didn't even bother shielding his spark and Megatron was able to swoop down on him in a matter of moments. Just as he was taking aim, though, one of his horizontal stabilizers spasmed, and he narrowly missed careening into a building. Bumblebee tried to evade him by ducking into a parking garage, but Megatron saw where the mech emerged on the other side just astroseconds later. Focusing solely on his flight mods, he was able to stick a landing this time half a block from Bumblebee. The Autobot transformed, and Megatron growled out his name in challenge.

Bumblebee unleashed his entire arsenal on Megatron, and the Decepticon almost laughed at how pathetic the attack was. The sting from fresh damage awoke a fierce lust for energon in his spark, and he swung his cannon-arm to take aim. The arm stopped short, though, and a full-frame twitch brought Megatron to his knees. Furiously, he punched the asphalt. He'd had this virus before - it shouldn't be able to _do_ that!

Another Autobot was coming to back up Bumblebee - Megatron could sense the poorly-shielded spark creeping closer from under the same building where Bumblebee had briefly tried to hide. The Decepticon staggered to his pedes, trying to train his fusion cannon on where the second Autobot would come into view, but the slagging virus made his arm jerk wildly.

It wasn't a Cybertronian that rounded the corner, though. It was a filthy meatbag. A human...with a spark? Stunned, the warlord stared for a surreal moment, not believing what his own sensors were telling him. It was Optimus' pet. Sam, that was his designation. But now that Megatron examined the spark's output more closely, he recognized the frequency. How could he not - it had been compatible with his own, before he'd severed his brother bond with Optimus.

This human was _Prime-bound_.

He burst out in sudden laughter. Optimus was so _fragged_! Megatron could step on the squishy now, he could tear his fleshy arms off, he could do nothing at all and let the creature die a natural death - no matter what, Optimus would _writhe_ because of this bond.

The spasms in his pedes and legs were enough to send him crashing to the ground, but he was too amused to be angry this time. "Weak!" he chortled, crawling on all fours toward Sam. The human skittered back in fear and Bumblebee was in front of him again, bristling with weapons. Megatron tried to shoot the annoying yellow 'bot, but missed and struck a skyscraper behind him. Bumblebee's missiles flew true, though, hitting and severely damaging the Decepticon's shoulder joint. If he tried to use the fusion cannon now, the recoil would blow his arm off.

Frustration roared through him again. Sneering, he growled at Sam. "I don't know how you did it, but this is better than any revenge even I could have planned." Two more of the Autobot's missiles struck home, and Megatron began to back away. "I'll still kill you - slowly and painfully - but I'll have the satisfaction of knowing I'm gutting Prime's spark in the process. Tell your brother _that_!"

Transforming, he took to the air. Thankfully no other Decepticons were there to witness how wobbly he was, and hopefully any other observers would assume his barrel-roll over Boston was intentional.

…

Lisbeth watched the exchange between Sam and the monster of a robot while cowering behind a flipped-over car (that thankfully was empty). When Cam resumed his Camaro shape, though, she mentally face palmed. Cam...Camaro. How did she not see it before?

Sam turned, frantically searching for her, and Lisbeth ran to him. He placed a steadying hand on her elbow and half-ran, half-led her toward where Cam sat with his doors open. "Come on, come on, in the car!"

She ducked into the passenger seat and got her seatbelt buckled just as Sam dove behind the wheel and the Camaro leaped forward, buckling Sam in for him. For several long, breathless minutes, they drove in silence as Sam watched the sky and Lisbeth tried to think of a way to bring up the elephant in the room without sounding like either a complete novice or an idiot.

Sam didn't seem to be convinced they were going to be okay until they crossed the George Washington Bridge and he slumped a little in his seat.

It was the radio that finally broke the ice. "So, I expect you have some questions for me?"

Sam shook himself and looked at Lisbeth like he just realized she was still in the car with him. "Oh. Yeah. Are you okay, Lisbeth?"

"Yeah…" she slowly answered.

"You didn't, like, get hurt by random falling debris or anything, right?"

"Nope. Not a scratch."

"Not gonna puke?"

She briefly considered her stomach. "No. Why would I?"

He snorted. "Shock can do that to people." Tilting his head, he added, "But you're as cool as a cucumber about all this. Did Fassbinder tell you?"

She felt a sudden spike of worry for her boyfriend. "Not exactly, but like I said, I pay attention. I kind of figured out Cam wasn't human last Christmas."

Sam gave her an incredulous look. "And you haven't told anybody else this whole time?"

She shrugged. "Who could I tell that would believe me?"

The radio played a laugh-track that Lisbeth recognized and all the questions she'd placed on the shelf during the alien duel came back with a vengeance. "Are my bags okay? I mean, you transformed and…"

"Subspace pockets," Sam said, "he hid them someplace not even Megatron could get to."

"Megatron?"

"The other robot."

She blinked for a second, trying to process it. "You mean, you put my theater makeup kit through a tesseract?"

A puzzled expression crossed Sam's face, but the radio played a round of applause. "By George, I think she's got it!"

Since the alien was willing to talk to her directly, or at least indirectly through the radio, Lisbeth asked the dashboard, "Is Sharsky one of you?"

Sam choked on a laugh. "Nope, humanity still takes the blame for that one."

Her eyes widened. "What about Fassbinder?"

"Fully human," Sam quipped, "besides, all the 'bots tend to get weirded out at the thought of kissing."

Cam played a long, drawn-out smooch over the radio followed by a jumble of jeers, laughter, and the sound of gagging.

She raised an eyebrow at that. "Not even with your human avatar?"

"They're called holoforms," Sam clarified, while 'Bee spliced several quotes together to say, "It'd be like pretending to get it on with puppets - not exactly satisfying."

Lisbeth laughed so hard she snorted and blushed to the ears. Clearly, Cam the Alien Robot had been spending too much time around Sharsky. Pulling herself together, she finally asked, "And what about your name? I mean Cam is just short for Camaro…"

The speakers played a clip of a bizarre song she'd never heard before. "Sweet little bumblebee…"

"His voice was damaged in battle," Sam softly explained. "He can only talk in sound-bites, but his real name - or a good translation of it, I guess - is Bumblebee."

Bumblebee. Well, that explained the paint job, at least. "I'm pleased to meet you for real, Bumblebee."

The speakers played another round of applause, along with the quote, "The feeling's mutual, lady."

"So," Sam interrupted, clearing his throat, "like 'Bee said, I'm sure you have a million questions, but we should try to answer as many of them as we can while driving. Just knowing about Bumblebee and his buddies is top-secret classified, and sometimes the walls really do have ears. You shouldn't talk about them even if it's just you and Fassbinder in the apartment."

Lisbeth pondered that for a moment, and then asked, "How long has Fassbinder known?"

Sam had to explain then about the alien robot warrior blog Fassbinder and Sharsky hacked all the way back in their freshman year, and Lisbeth's follow-up questions kept them talking and laughing the entire way home. They dropped off her luggage at her apartment and then they all went back over to the boys' place.

As Sam, Lisbeth, and Cam walked through the door, Sharsky said, "Perfect timing! Two pizzas and a cheesy bread will be ready for pick-up in ten minutes."

Cam's phone played, "Hi, honey, I'm home."

Fassbinder was sitting on the couch, looking slightly glassy-eyed as he stared at his laptop's screen.

"Hey, babe, you okay?" Lisbeth asked as she sat down beside him.

"He OD'd on Red Bull again," Leo said. "I wanted backup before I tried to pull an intervention." Then he whacked Fassbinder on the back of of the head.

Her boyfriend jumped. "What?!" Owlishly, he stared at Lisbeth. "When did you get here?"

"Um, just a minute ago?"

"Any closer to a fix for the bug?" Sam asked Sharsky.

It was Fassbinder who answered, though. "Not yet, but those guys from the Pentagon are stumped, too, and even the Hatchet's having fits, so they might fly us out to that base where we'll either write the antidote or disappear for the rest of our lives."

Sharsky was tugging on Sam's arm. "Pizza's gonna be ready before we get there."

Lisbeth tilted her head curiously. Was Sharsky trying to get Sam away from the others so they could talk about aliens in Cam's...Bumblebee's cab?

Her lips twitched in a smile. "Hey Sam," she called out as Sharsky all but dragged him out the door. "Thanks for the ride. Next time, though, take me to your leader."

Sam grinned. "Oh, you met him last summer."

Lisbeth's brow furrowed in confusion and then her eyes widened in surprise. "Optimus?!"

Leo, Sharsky, and Fassbinder froze in shock, but Sam grabbed Sharsky and headed toward the carport.

" _Another_ chick in our boy's club?" Leo protested.

"Wait, what the…" Fassbinder babbled.

Lisbeth kicked back and put her feet up on the coffee table. Grinning like the cat that ate the canary, she said, "Well, you know, I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."


End file.
